West Indies: Rousseau speaks out - loud and clear (5 November 1998)

5 November 1998

West Indies: Rousseau speaks out - loud and clear

The Barbados Nation

West Indies Cricket Board president Pat Rousseau fired from the hip yesterday as he blasted Brian Lara and Carl Hooper for damaging the image of West Indies cricket.

Minutes after reading the release which told the world of the sacking of Lara as captain, Hooper as vice-captain, and their removal from the team for the historic tour of South Africa, Rousseau said: "I would like to add a few comments of my own" and proceeded to set the record straight as far as the players' behaviour was concerned.

"I'm particularly disturbed at this development," said Rousseau. "I think the actions of these players have done really serious harm to West Indies cricket, the reputation of West Indies cricket, the West Indies public, the West Indies spectators and the cricket board, and equally, they have created major problems for us with our sponsors.

"We've had several calls on the subject already, we've created enormous problems for the United Cricket Boards of South Africa who are our hosts and who were very, very keen to have a West Indies team on tour in South Africa for the first time.

"This is a historic visit, a special ceremony is planned before the first Test match and to believe that players, on the information we have, on the flimsiest of reasons, had put all that in jeopardy and brought West Indies cricket into disrepute, I find extremely disturbing.

"Even more disturbing is that I have spent the past 2 1/2 years building a relationship with these players, starting with that historic banquet in Kinston, that I have built a relationship with individual players of this team, and yet, starting on Monday morning when the chief executive officer, Mr. Comacho, called me and I tried to call them on the telephone to make contact to try and find out what is happening, we were unable to get a response. I find all of this extremely disturbing and I do not think that was a fitting response to the effort that this particularly board has made to re-establish an excellent working relationship with the team.

"We can have problems, but we certainly have codes and procedures we need to follow. If they have matters that are bothering them, one would think that we are their employers, that they would notify the board of those problems, either through their association or directly. It is common courtesy, give a time to say that if you don't address these issues we will take industrial action.

"We were merely told by the gentlemen that they were going to London, that they wanted a meeting. They merely picked up a phone and said we are leaving Bangladesh tomorrow morning and we want a meeting in London on Tuesday. It was almost like a shotgun to the head and when we responded and said we are quite willing to meet you but we can't meet you in London on 24 hours notice, the result is that the team, nine members of the team, sit in London and refused to travel on to South Africa. And up to now, I have to tell you, we have not got a satisfactory explanation of why theyq did not proceed to South Africa and have the discussion in South Africa."

Rousseau ended by saying, "I really don't understand what went on. I hope that that we don't ever have to face that again."

Source :: The Jamaica Gleaner (https://www.jamaica-gleaner.com/)